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Camden layoffs impacting snow removal efforts

In post-layoff Camden, officials rearranged personnel Thursday to get the city's 20 pieces of snow-removal equipment out to clean up the mess left by 2011's first major storm.

In post-layoff Camden, officials rearranged personnel Thursday to get the city's 20 pieces of snow-removal equipment out to clean up the mess left by 2011's first major storm.

About a foot of snow fell Wednesday and early Thursday in the region, and though the city said the number of the people who worked removing snow was not affected, residents had mixed reactions on the quality of the cleanup.

More than 300 city employees were laid off last week, including 35 from the Public Works Department, which handles snow removal.

Lifetime Camden resident Kai Green, 30, said Thursday's snow removal was "much worse" than in recent years.

She and her husband, Michael, 34, took their Ford Expedition to run some errands and got stuck near Cooper University Hospital in the Lanning Square neighborhood, which she said was usually clear. "That's how bad it was."

Along the business section on Broadway, they found nowhere to park, she said. Street parking had been turned into snow banks.

City spokesman Robert Corrales did not return phone calls at the end of the day seeking comment on the city's progress clearing the snow.

Most of Camden's main arteries, such as Broadway and Ferry Avenue, were drivable by midafternoon. But most side streets still had a thick layer of snow.

Sidewalks? Forget about it. Residents were walking in the middle of the streets downtown and in their neighborhoods.

At 3 p.m., people were still digging out their cars and shoveling their driveways.

"I'm doing it in spells," said Lisa Hickman, shovel in hand. Her Washington Street sidewalk had been cleared earlier by a neighbor who had a snowblower.

"We give each other a hand," she said.

Hickman, who has lived on the street for 13 years, said she was used to doing some shoveling herself because she lives on a side street. She said she thought the plows had been keeping up with the main streets, though.